


Unexpected Company

by yuuago



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Autumn, Cats, Coffee, Fluff, Gen, ToT: Chocolate Box, Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-31
Updated: 2016-10-31
Packaged: 2018-08-19 06:05:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,527
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8193065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuuago/pseuds/yuuago
Summary: Norway adopts a cat?A cat adopts Norway?...Why not both?





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [xhorhas](https://archiveofourown.org/users/xhorhas/gifts).



> Hi, Qichi! Here's some short fluff with a few of your favourite things. :D  
> Many thanks to L for help with the beta work.

The air is cold.

It has a sharpness to it, a familiar crispness that he always welcomes at this time of year. A sweetness, too, hanging in the air due to the apples that have fallen, the ones that he hasn’t yet cleared away from beneath their tree. Under all those scents lingers a loamy basenote punctuated by frosted earth and damp leaves.

Norway breathes deeply, takes in that coolness as he works with the rake. Takes his time. No need to rush it.

Autumn has come with love to this village, the one he has inhabited for years, though he has not always lived in the same house. The mornings are dark, the afternoons golden. Time moves slowly here, and this autumn is moving slowly, too. It’s taking its time. Norway's glad for that. He isn't quite ready for the rain that always follows, endless and damp and biting to the bone until winter sweeps in and chills the whole lot.

Something is watching him. Well, someone. Somewhat. Norway is aware of eyes peering at him from atop the fence. He doesn’t show that he knows damn well that something is there, not at first. Just keeps going with the rake. There are a lot of leaves to clear away, and he has all day to do it. That’s fine.

It’s that cat again. He turns, just a little. Keeps his head down. Watches it out of the corner of his eye. It's a big, black, long-haired, yellow-eyed thing. Perching atop the fence, balancing without a thought. The first time it showed up, and he felt those eyes on him, Norway assumed it was some creature. Maybe a fairy, or elf, or troll, or something else. But then he caught sight of it. Or it let him see it.

Better cats than trolls, he'd decided. They're less apt to make a mess of things.

The cat isn't from the farm down the way. At least, Norway thinks it isn't. He's been to Ida's place enough times that he knows most of her cats, knows both the ones belong to her and the ones that just hang around the barn. He hasn't seen this one there. Not at all.

It notices that he's watching it. He can see it tense, even more unmoving than it was a second ago. Then it drops down from the fence. Disappears.

He lets it go.

It'll be back, eventually. Maybe.

* * *

Outside, it is comfortable, bright. One of those sunny autumn days that could be a postcard image if someone bothered to snap a photo.

The coffee brews. Norway waits, looking idly out the kitchen window. Going outside to read will be best, he thinks, sliding his thumb along the spine off a novel he had read halfway through the night before. It isn't too cold. Not jacket weather, this. The thick hand-knit sweater he's wearing will do. And he really should make the best of the nice weather while he can.

A dark shape steals across the backyard.

It's that cat again.

Norway watches it. Doesn't move. Waits to see what it'll do.

It crosses the yard slowly. Not sneakily, but stepping through leisurely, like it owns the place. Like it has every right to be there. Like it can take all the time in the world if it wants to. Stepping with light feet, it keeps going until it reaches a particular spot on the patio, brightened with light, as sun-warmed as anything outside can get at this time of year.

Then it plunks itself down, and stretches out, and yawns.

Norway waits. Watches.

The coffee perks and he tends to it, pouring it from the percolator into his thermos. Today is not too cold for reading, but it is too cold for mugs, and he can't abide his coffee chilling before he has a chance to drink it.

Once more, he glances at that cat. It's made itself comfortable there. Norway hesitates for a moment, and then decides to do what he set out to do. It's _his_ house, after all.

He pushes the patio door open.

The cat lifts its head. Stares at him.

He stares back. Takes a step.

It bolts.

He watches it go, speeding across the lawn, ducking under the gate. Just as expected.

Norway sinks down. Opens his book. Reads a while, enjoying his coffee and his book and the crispness of the afternoon and the scent of the autumn air.

After a while, he can feel eyes on him. He glances up.

The cat is perched on top of the fence, watching.

Norway looks back to his book, and lets it be.

* * *

It's raining.

The downpour started during supper. A few drops at first, thick and fat on the window panes, and then a sudden downpour that just kept going. It doesn't show any sign of stopping.

Norway lifts the curtain. Peers out at the blackness. He can't see much of anything through the rain-streaked kitchen window. The light from inside spills out, but it only reaches so far into the dark.

Still. Something's out there. He can't see it, but he can feel that something's out there. It's strange.

He lets the curtain drop. Decides it's best to leave well enough alone. If there's something – or someone – out there, then they'll either make themselves known, or they won't. Resolved in that, he moves to clean up the dishes from supper. Run the water. Put everything in order while outside the rain comes down, and down, and down.

The noise comes when he's nearly finished. Something pawing at the patio door. Norway dries his hands, and blinks over at the window, looking and trying to see what it might be. 

Nothing.

The sound comes again. Pawing, scratching, followed by a meow.

Ah. There it is.

He goes to open the door. The cat shoots in as soon as there's space enough for it. Bolts through the door and disappears into the living room.

It's the same cat, Norway thinks, as he shuts the door. At least, it probably is. He can't really be sure; it ran in so fast that he couldn't get a good look at it, and that rain-soaked thing looked a good deal different from the fluffy beast he's seen in his yard.

He finds the cat, eventually. Hiding behind the couch, peering out at him. Refusing to move no matter how much he coaxes it. As far as Norway can tell, it isn't hurt; just wet, and irritable, and not wanting any fuss, thank _you_ very much.

Fair enough.

After considering it for a while, he puts out some water, and some dry food left over from the last time he kept a cat. Good enough.

Sometimes, it's better to just leave well enough alone.

* * *

Norway wakes in the morning with the cat dozing at the foot of the bed.

It's an improvement from all the times he's woken up with it on his face.

They've come to an agreement, the two of them. It isn't a verbal contract, on account of the obvious fact that they don't speak the same language, but it works out well for the two of them.

It's simple, that agreement. Uncomplicated. Norway provides the food, and the house, and the occasional cat toy now and then. In return, he's graced with the cat's company.

At least, that seems to be how the cat finds it. And as far as Norway's concerned, that's just fine. He isn't about to argue with that one. He's learned over the years that it's best not to argue with someone that you can't beat in a staring contest.

He doesn't mind, anyway. It's been a while since he's had a cat around, and the mice that he's seen out in the garden – well. There are fewer of them, now.

Late morning. Coffee. Norway draws up the blinds to let in the light, because he knows that soon there won't be much of that. In a few weeks, it'll be gone. Letting the sunlight wash in while he sits on the sofa with his mug to drink the first coffee of the morning will be impossible in the winter's darkness, when the sun can hardly be bothered to lift its ass above the horizon. He'll see neither hide nor hair of it until spring.

Norway sits and savours that last bit of light. Mug in one hand, book on his lap, and the cat on the sofa beside him –

Oh.

Make that... mug in one hand, book in the other hand, and the cat on his lap.

Norway frowns at it. Raises an eyebrow. Stares down at it for a moment.

The cat lifts its head. Stares back, bright yellow eyes unblinking in that fluffy black face.

Fine.

Slowly, he closes the book. Sets the mug on the couchside table.

As he slowly strokes the cat's head, the purr that rolls up from it is rumbling, steady, satisfied.

"You win," Norway mutters. A smile tugs at the corner of his lips.

He won't get any reading done this morning, but that's all right.

It's nice to have company again.


End file.
